Everything is looking calm and quiet in the world of cryptocurrency. That is a more than welcome change after so many weeks of price volatility and uncertainty. The Bitcoin price holds its own around the US$3,175 mark for the time being, whereas other currencies also note some gains or small losses. Antshares, or NEO as it is known these days, is clearly the winner of the weekend with a 25.8% gain, though.

In the normal world of cryptocurrency as we know it, a Bitcoin price gain often leads to altcoins bleeding value. That has been the case for many years now, but it looks like the trend is reversing every so often. More specifically, the recent Bitcoin price gains to US$3,175 and beyond have not caused any major damage for altcoins yet. Bitcoin Cash is the one exception, but that project will face its own struggles for quite some time to come, regardless of how the Bitcoin price evolves. It is still the fourth-largest cryptocurrency by market cap but losing ground quickly these days.

What is rather remarkable is how Ethereum is gaining in value as well. The past few months have not been easy for this alternative currency. Network issues, ICO hacks, and some other factors have driven the price down quite a bit. Things are finally looking up again for Ethereum, though, thanks to a 7.25% gain in the past 24 hours. Ethereum also has slightly more trading volume than Bitcoin, which could hint at more price gains to come in the [near] future.

Prices for Litecoin, NEM, Ethereum Classic, and Dash have all remained virtually unchanged, barring some small losses and gains. Status quo in the cryptocurrency world is a very rare sight to behold and it looks like this is certainly one of the few times we can actually witness it. Rest assured this situation may look very different in a few hours from now, but at the time of writing, it is almost a peaceful picture to behold. One has to appreciate the finer things in life as well.

That being said, there is one currency, which catapulted itself into the top 10 all of a sudden. We discussed the concept of Antshares now known as NEO not too long ago. The project aims to become the Ethereum of China, which is a pretty bold statement. Then again, it is good to see projects with no lack of ambition these days. There have been far too many clones and copycat coins over these past few years, that much is evident. NEO is now the tenth-largest currency by market cap, thanks to a 25.84% gain over the past 24 hours.

There are no boring days in the world of cryptocurrency, even when most top altcoins remain stable. The big news of this weekend is how Bitcoin finally broke the previous all-time high and is seemingly able to hold its own without much effort. Its nice to see a Bitcoin price in US$3,175 and higher, as it has been coming for some time now. With a market cap of nearly US$53bn, Bitcoin is looking a lot stronger than it has ever done before. Maintaining this position for an extended period of time will still be a challenge, even for the king of cryptocurrencies.

Next week will be an interesting period to keep an eye on cryptocurrency pricing charts. No major news is expected, but rest assured market manipulators and speculators will try to shake things up once again. It is unclear what this might mean for the Bitcoin price over the next few days, though. Most of the volume pushing the price up came from Asia. That volume can dry up pretty quickly as well as send prices crashing down again. These price charts will look very different a week from now, that much is almost a certainty.

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Bitcoin Price Holds Firm, Major Gains Catapult NEO Into Cryptocurrency top 10 - The Merkle